Air Service Boys over the Atlantic eBook

“Excuse me if I act a little looney, fellows!”
he begged. “Fact is, I’m just keyed
up to topnotch and something will give way unless I
let off steam a bit.”

With that he yelled and laughed and cheered until
his breath gave out. Neither of the others felt
any inclination to try to stop his antics. Truth
to tell, they were tempted to egg Jack on, because
he was really expressing in his own fashion something
of the same exultation that all of them felt.

The great flight had been carried through, and here
they were landed on the soil of America, three young
aviators who but a few days before had been serving
their country on the fighting-front in Northern France.
Yes, the Atlantic had been successfully bridged by
a heavier-than-air plane, and from the time of leaving
France until this minute their feet had not once pressed
any soil; for that ice-pack in mid-Atlantic could not
be counted against them, since it too was nothing
but congealed water.

“But the poor old bomber! It’s ruined,
Colin, I’m afraid,” Jack finally managed
to say, when he sank down from his exertions.

“That’s a small matter,” Beverly
assured him. “The main thing is that we
did what we set out to do, and proved that the dream
of all real airmen could be made to come true.
We may live to see a procession of monster boats of
the air setting out for over-seas daily, carrying passengers,
as well as mail and express matter.”

“Yes,” said Tom gravely, and yet with
a pardonable trace of pride in voice and manner, “the
Atlantic has been conquered, and saddled, and bridled,
like any wild broncho of the plains. But hadn’t
we better be thinking of getting out of this soft
marshy tract?”

“As quickly as we possibly can,” Jack
told him. “We’ll try to run across
some Virginia farmer, black or white, who will have
a horse and agree to take us to the nearest railroad
station. Once we hit civilization, the rest will
be easy.”

“What about the plane, Colin?” asked Tom.

“It can stay here for the time being,”
the other answered him. “Later on I’ll
hire some one to have it hauled out and stored against
my coming back—­after we’ve been a
while in Berlin and got Heine to behaving himself.”

They secured such things as it was desirable they
should keep. Acting on Tom’s advice everything
that might testify to their identity was also removed,
lest the bogged plane be accidentally discovered and
betray them. Afterwards they set out to find
a way beyond the borders of the marsh and scrub oaks,
to some place where possibly they might get assistance.

CHAPTER XXIV

SURPRISING BRIDGETON

“Here’s the end of the marshy tract,”
Tom said, after they had been floundering around for
some little time.

“How fine it feels to be on solid ground again,”
Jack observed, stamping his feet as though he really
enjoyed the sensation.